For Apps, iPhone Growing Faster than Facebook

Updated: When it comes to apps, the iPhone platform is now bigger growing fast than the Facebook platform, according to a report by Flurry, a San Francisco-based mobile analytics company. The company compared the first 18 months in the life of the two platforms and counted the number of applications developed for the two platforms during that period. Flurry said today that Apple’s (s aapl) iTunes App Store has over 140,000 applications compared to 60,000 apps available in the first 18 months of the availability of the Facebook platform.

That’s quite amazing, considering that Facebook launched its platform more than a year earlierthan the iPhone platform and has north of 400 million users. In comparison, the iPhone OS platform has about 70 million devices. And developer momentum for the iPhone platform isn’t going to wane anytime soon.

With the iPad showing up as a platform extension, more developers are looking to focus their energies on the iPhone platform. “Over six weeks since Apple announced the iPad, Flurry continues to measure a significant increase in iPhone OS new application starts within its system,” the analytics firm said. Much of it is said to be developers looking to adapt their applications for the larger-format device.

The most interesting part of the Flurry report was the iPhone developer DNA. Its analysis revealed the following categories:

Despite the fact that the App Store is now maturing, reaching its two year anniversary this summer, we are encouraged that native iPhone application developers are still relevant, representing 20% of the heritage pie, the second largest category. This means that the barrier to entry is still low enough for start-ups to enter and innovation to flourish. However, those days may be numbered as “discoverability” has become a significant issue, and now “marketing muscle” is starting to count more in the App Store.

Update with corrections: After publishing this story, it was brought to my attention that the data from Flurry was faulty. A Facebook spokesperson pointed out that there are:

* More than 500,000 active applications currently on Facebook Platform.

* More than 250 applications have more than one million monthly active users.

* More than 80,000 websites have implemented Facebook Connect since its general availability in December 2008.

Flurry’s VP of president Peter Fargo responded to this data in an email:

We had a sentence in our report that insinuated the App Store has more applications than Facebook does today. The point we meant to make is that the App Store has more than twice the number of apps than than facebook did at its 18 month mark (which fb reached in Nov of 2008). Our graph is correct but we made a mistake in the description of the paragraph.

The company subsequently updated its report.

“…For example, comparing the number of applications created for the Facebook platform to the App Store over their respective first 9 months, Apple boasted 25,000 apps to Facebook’s 14,000. Comparing respective growth in apps after 14 months, Apple had widened its gap to 85,000 apps over Facebook’s 33,000. At the App Store’s 18 month mark, reached this January, the number of iPhone apps was reported to have exceeded 140,000 compared to the 60,000 we estimate Facebook had reached over its first 18 months. We believe the difference in growth rates can be attributed to the App Store providing better monetization possibilities for application developers than Facebook did through its first 18 months. Developers, like all rational companies, pursue markets where the path to revenue generation is clear.”

This update clearly changes the focus of the original story. The error is regretting.

And comparing Android to the iPhone, it’s not really fair to say that Android is catching up to iPhone in terms of apps. Of course they are but it’s not because of popularity, it’s just because iPhone app developers are now making a Android version of their app as well.

Lols Facebook is a social client. Iphone is a complete os with gps, battery, g-sensors…the list goes on. The comparison makes as much sense as comparing Twitter development to Windows development. A more direct comparison would be Apple and android development, as they are at least comparable platforms.

But strategically they still have left an opening for another Company to take over the mobile apps market. While they have driven down the price for the consumer to acquire apps. They haven’t done much to broaden the “Programmers” base.

What I mean here in a very simplified way:

First came the Spreadsheet, which converted “normal” office workers into accountants without their support staff (mainframe programmers). Then we got macros, which converted the “lets try this” accountants into “lets try this” programmers. This trend continued on with VB. To converting “normal” people into Gamers, Wii.

We haven’t seen this trend in the online (just throwing mobile and web together) world to get to a “lets try this”. The entry to programming is still to complex in this world.
I think Apple being Apple will not solve this, nor Google with its “we know best” attitude. Facebook?

The Web and mobile still require a lot of support staff (programmers). Just like reports produced by the good old accountants did, where is the spreadsheet? Over simplified? I know. But the premise of “smart” machines is to get rid of support staff(sorry).

iPhone gives developers a bigger canvas to paint compared to FB in terms of UI elements, processing functionalities and a rich target audience to sell the apps to. However, as the number of apps grows, searching the quality ones is becoming a bigger problem for end users.